Coupon-clipping, meal-planning the high-tech way

In this day and age, it seems like everyone is trying to pinch pennies and save money as much as possible. Although the recession is beginning to fade, many of us are still  trying to catch deals and cut our costs.  Lucky for us, technology is constantly supplying us with all sorts of techniques to get us that golden deal. 

Each week on Frugal Family, we will feature a different theme of deals guaranteed to save you money. 

This week’s Frugal Family tip is about groceries. With the national average cost of groceries for a family of four hovering just below $1,000 per month, families are seeking new ways to cut their grocery spending. Here are some techniques that will lead us to grocery shopping victory.

1. Make a list and stick with it.  This might seem obvious, but if you don’t go into the supermarket with a game plan, you will probably end up spending more than you bargained for.
2. Get bulk items once a month or less.  For my weekly trips to the grocery store, I realized I only need to get just the essentials like milk, eggs, bread, produce, and meat to supplement the bigger items that last longer and can be bought in bulk. 
3. Buy produce that is in season.  Right now, there is an abundance of winter vegetables ready, available and on sale.  This includes delicious healthy produce like blueberries, Brussels sprouts, root vegetables, spinach, pears, avocados, broccoli, cauliflower, and apples.  This site lists out local farmers markets and seasonal produce.
4. Use high-tech coupons.  I hate coupon clipping.  I could never sit down with scissors and cut little squares out of the newspaper to save 25 cents on toilet paper.  But now, stores and websites are beginning to post coupons online, which can be used with a smart phone or even loaded onto your club card, like Safeway.

Here are some of the best websites and sources I’ve found to save money at the grocery store:

• Safeway.com-By using your club card, you can create shopping preferences and receive personal coupons that are automatically loaded onto your card as well as print out a shopping list of your deals.  Also, the first time you sign up, you can register for a free carton of eggs.  Pretty good, if you ask me.  Seen this week are spices for almost half off, and blueberries, 6 oz. for $3.
• Wholefoods.com-I normally wouldn’t recommend Whole Foods to someone trying to save money, but now that there is one 15 minutes away from Healdsburg --in Santa Rosa at the Coddingtown Mall -- it’s ever so tempting.  The good news is that Whole Foods produce is all organic and their bread is pretty reasonably priced.  They also feature an abundance of coupons on their website.  Whole Foods also has an amazing array of affordable gluten-free products.
• -Our local Big John’s still delivers the specials the old fashioned way: through the an ad in the , but it does have prices that rival specials at Safeway.  Seen this week are Amy’s Organic Soups for $1.99 and 28 oz. cans of organic tomatoes, two for $4.  By looking for the yellow tags in the aisle, you can buy deeply discounted items at Big John’s bulk price.

5.  Plan your meals.  I am trying to plan at least a few meals a week so that grocery shopping will be more strategic and will enable me to reuse certain ingredients I buy.  For example, I bought lots of frozen spinach on sale and root vegetables to make quiche one night, a potato curry and a vegetarian lasagna with the final vegetables that I haven’t used up yet.  Strategic menu-planning not only gives you an easy shopping list, but it prevents you from buying unnecessary items that could go bad and have to be tossed.

I found a free website called Meals Matter that helps to plan meals and also features many nutritious and fun kid-friendly recipes.  If you’re like me and live on your iPhone, you can also download apps to help you do everything from plan your meals, make shopping lists, to even finding out each meal’s nutritional information.  I just downloaded Meal Builder Pro, which was $1.99 on the iTunes App store.

Another helpful site in general is Money Saving Mom. This blog, written specifically for the budget-conscious mom, features daily coupons to save on everything from diapers to audiobooks.  I could spend hours grazing on the advice and ways to save on just about everything. 

Share your money-saving ideas with other moms and family kitchen managers below in the comments.